


The First Time

by Reikah



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, First Dates, M/M, Mage Underground, The Spirit-Human Divide, minor animal death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-01
Updated: 2016-11-01
Packaged: 2018-08-28 12:36:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8446048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reikah/pseuds/Reikah
Summary: Spirits, romance, and rebellion make for very strange bedfellows. The Hanged Man’s door is nothing, at this point in the professional bar-fighting season, so much as a sad, spindly bit of wood, tied onto the jamb with twine.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for Tumblr's Handers Week a while ago, since edited. The prompt was "beginnings" or, alternatively, "Write a fic about Hawke and Anders's first date."
> 
> AKA, 'Reikah's Super Serious Thoughts on Justice In A Friendmance: The Fic'.

The Hanged Man’s door is nothing, at this point in the professional bar-fighting season, so much as a sad, spindly bit of wood, tied onto the jamb with twine; when Aveline pushes it open it slides pathetically off the frame and leans there crookedly, and she swears under her breath as she bodily wrestles it back into its rightful place.

“There’s the woman of the hour,” Isabela calls, draped across their table. She has a mug of ale in her hand and probably by this time of day many more mugs already inside her, and her eyes are sparkling with mischief. “So! How did your attempt to get your scabbard plundered go?”

“ _Isabela_ ,” Hawke says, but too lazily to be any kind of effective deterrent. He is, as per usual these days, far more interested in Anders than anyone or anything else. His thumb rests against the base of Anders’s skull, elbow on the back of the chair; his fingers card slowly and affectionately through the fine hairs at the nape of Anders's neck, back and forth, back and forth. 

Aveline undoes her cloak, glaring slowly around at the rest of the table. Fenris looks incurious, his eyes on his cards; Varric is barely hiding a smirk behind his sleeve; Merrill is all wide innocent green eyes; and Isabela... Oh, Isabela. The pirate is smirking like the cat who found not just the cream but also her owner’s premium lamb steak defrosting unsupervised on the kitchen side.

“Who told her?” Aveline asks, her hands on her hips. She had, very deliberately, excluded Isabela when she asked Hawke to help out with the marigolds.

“Oh, _relax_ , big girl,” Isabela laughs, tossing her hair back. “That’s what this was all about, wasn’t it? You and Guardsman - what was it, Dominic? - studying each other’s patrol routes, lighting each other's beacons, polishing each other's truncheons - if you catch my drift.”

Aveline pinches the bridge of her nose. “How long have you been preparing these?”

“Only since this afternoon,” Isabela says, smirking. “Not to worry, you big ox. _I_ think it’s sweet. I couldn’t think of a worthier woman when it comes to sudden… barracks inspections. Better make sure everything’s all clean and tidy, even under the topsheet, hmm?”

“Enough, strumpet,” Aveline snaps, yanking back her chair opposite Hawke. The sharp movement earns her a brief glance from the man in question, his own ridiculous, infatuated expression broken briefly with surprise. Maker, she hopes she doesn’t look like that. It’s been months.

Isabela leans across the table, elbow sharp against the wood, cheek pillowed fat against her fist. Her eyes are sparkling. Aveline rolls her eyes, but can't quite keep back a small smile, and regrets it only slightly when the pirate wench's mouth curves slowly upward like the Tantervale cat. “So," Isabela purrs. "I wonder what’s next? Decorative flower-based metalwork aside, how are you planning on celebrating the first date?”

Anders snorts derisively. Aveline hadn't even known he had been listening; he had been sitting there with his eyes halfway open, head tilted to give Hawke easier access to the back of his neck, shoulders more relaxed than Aveline had ever seen them. They're tensing up again now, despite the gentle ministrations of Hawke's thumb against the base of his skull, and his eyes glitter with disdain amidst the Hanged Man's gloom. “Isn't that what we spent hours wandering the Wounded Coast facilitating?” His words are sharp, but his tone is not; Hawke’s thumb is slipping up to carress the shell of his right ear, his touch languid and unhurried. 

A week ago Aveline had found their intimacy embarrassing; now, she thinks she understands.

“What’s a date?” Merrill asks.

“When two humans love each other very much,” Varric says, grinning into his beer, “And don’t belong to rigidly caste-based social systems -”

“Are you telling me you’ve never taken Bianca somewhere special?” Isabela clasps her hand over her bosom, mock-horrified. “Varric, Varric, _Varric_! If you keep that up, someone worthier will end up spiriting your lady love away from right beneath your nose.”

“I have a knife,” Varric replies amiably. “And friends with even more knives.”

“Good to know,” Isabela shoots back, “I love a challenge.”

“So… a date is a human ritual? With knives?” Merrill’s brow scrunches. “I thought you liked Donnic, Aveline.”

“I do,” Aveline replies. “Ignore the pirate wench, Merrill. A date is just people who… appreciate each other… spending time with each other. Getting to know one another better before making any big decisions.”

“With knives?” Merrill asks. Her eyes are very big. Not for the first time, Aveline wonders if Merrill does this deliberately.

“No,” she says.

“ _Yes_ ,” Isabela counters. “Knives make things fun. Zevran - a friend of mine, he taught me to knife-fight on a date. It only ended when I kicked him unexpectedly in the crotch, then his eyes watered, he said -” she adopted a ridiculous Antivan accent, and also the knock-kneed pose of a man kicked in a sensitive place, thighs sliding across the rough wood of her chair - “Ah, my lovely Isabela, so quickly the student becomes the master, no? And, well, we just had to try to kiss it better.”

“I don’t need to hear about your many conquests,” Aveline says, leaning to one side as Norah approaches with a tray bearing multiple mugs, foaming with the Hanged Man’s sharply bitter ale. She gives the woman ten silver as a tip, and watches some of the spring return to the waitress’s step as she returns to the bar; she’ll get better service all evening - Varric wasn’t wrong when he told her to try the strategy.

Isabela pouts. “Well, unless anyone here has a better date story,” she says. “Fenris?”

Fenris rolls his eyes. “Slavery and dating often go hand in hand,” he says, topping up his old ale with his new one.

“Really?” Merrill asks.

Fenris’s sneer is the stuff of legend. “No.”

“My last date took me to a fancy restaurant in Hightown,” Varric says. “‘Course, she was a merchant guild girl, so the last course was a slice of Antivan Crow pie. _And_ she left me with the bill.”

“The least she could have done was split it,” Hawke agrees. He’s now stroking the edges of Anders’s jawbone, thumb rasping audibly over the stubble; Anders has his eyes half-closed, swaying toward Hawke like one almost hypnotized.

“No manners,” Anders agrees. Even his voice sounds low, drowsy, not unlike a cat in a sunbeam.

“What about you, Hawke?” Merrill asks. “Have you and Anders been on any dates?”

Anders's shoulders tense, and he jerks upright, away from Hawke's thumb; arms folded upon the tabletop, he scowls down at his cup, jaw locked and brows drawn. Hawke, who coughs and shifts his weight in his chair, reaching for his ale tankard with the arm that had until so very recently been _petting_ his sour apostate, for lack of a better word. Isabela leans across the table, grinning. “Come on, lads,” she says, “Tell us, we’re bored.”

“Speak for yourself,” Fenris says. 

He goes to take a sip of his ale and then freezes, rearing back with his mouth twisting; slamming his mug down onto the table, he reaches a gauntletted hand into his drink, past the foam, and draws a drowned rat corpse out from beneath the surface by its tail; it dangles between his forefinger and thumb, sad testament to the Hanged Man’s hygiene. There’s a moment of mesmerized silence all round, broken, of course, by Hawke. “If you’re not gonna eat that,” he says, “Pass it over.”

“If you're saving that for your dog, that's revolting,” Anders says, flatly.

“Frugal,” Hawke corrects, cheerfully accepting the rat when Fenris wordlessly tosses it his way, ale droplets spraying across the tabletop. A flick of his wrist and the corpse is under the table, followed by slobbery crunching noises.

“You two must have so much fun in those Hightown restaurants,” Isabela says. She thumps her chest with her palm, once, like a drumbeat, and in a booming imitation of Anders - if Anders boomed, rather than complained - says, “'Waiter, bring me a glass of wine AND JUSTICE!”

Anders winces. “That’s not how it works,” he says.

“So explain,” Varric says. He has a quill in hand, quite suddenly. Not for the first time, the entire table suddenly recalls he’s a better lockpicker than Isabela, for all her wriggled fingers and sniggered comments about feminine dexterity, eyebrows bouncing up and down at ridiculous velocity just to see Aveline blush.

“Anders and I don’t have that kind of relationship,” Hawke says, suddenly interested in the table. Next to him, Anders has gotten very tense, very quickly.

“Oh please,” Varric said. “Two renegade apostates, 'the love that dare not speak its name’ and so on? What, you sit around the house and read his manifesto to each other?”

Isabela nudges Fenris, giggling. “Naughty templar and secret desire demon,” she says.

“I cannot unsee that image,” Fenris tells his drink mournfully.

“It’s…” Hawke hesitates, glancing around the table, and swallows. His smile is a little terse. “Well, my mother told me, a date should be about something you both enjoy. Something you both like.”

“With Anders?” Aveline asks, unable to stop herself. The concept of Anders and 'enjoy’ is, nowadays, an increasingly harder one to envision.

“Rugged Knight-Captain and suspected apostate,” Isabela says, grinning.

“Oooh,” Merrill says, “Blood mage and city guard? Am I doing it right?”

“Don’t,” Anders says. He’s still glaring down at the table.

“Blondie,” Varric says, suddenly cautious; there’s a fine blue glow, spiderweb cracks on the backs of Anders’s knuckles…

Hawke reaches out, far too casually, and sets his palm over the back of Anders’s hand. “Tell you what,” he says, “We went on a date together just three nights ago.”

Anders stills. The glow subsides beneath Hawke’s touch. “Hawke,” he says, tersely, “Love -”

“Where did you go?” Merrill asks, putting her elbow on the table.

“Somewhere scenic,” Hawke says. “Somewhere evocative. Somewhere,” he leans forward over the table, perhaps aware that he has their attention. “That reminded us both of what drew us together.”

* * *

The cell was cold stone, and silent, and buried so far underneath the ground it was like the earth swallowed up all noise. Even the sound of his breathing was subdued, much less Hawke’s restless pacing, boots scuffing over dry mud and cracked stone from the dug-in wall.

“How many?” he asked.

“Two,” Anders said. He held a ball of blue magefire in his palm, the only thing holding darkness, and silence, and the crushing stone at bay. That, and the sense of purpose radiating calmly from his breath along with the condensation. “Both apprentices. The Templars are closing in on Anaya. She’s leaving town tomorrow, these are the last few she thinks she can get us.”

Hawke reached the end of the cell, turned, started over again. Four strides it took. His dog, lying quietly next to the exit hole the Underground had made in the corner, watched him without lifting its head from its paws, eyes glittering blue in the dark. “And there’s a boat waiting at the coast?”

“Should be,” Anders said, leaning back against the wall. He let the magefire brighten, blue chasing away shadows, making the world clearer. Hawke paused in his pacing, looked at him; in silhouette his expression was unreadable, but his posture was tight, unhappy.

“Two,” he said. “Apprentices. Maker’s Breath.”

“Yes,” Anders said, and felt the word curiously echoed within his breast. Yes. They were in agreement. This was not just. “Put your mask back on. She can’t see your face, love.”

“Right,” Hawke said, and ducked his head; the mask was an inelegant, unrefined hood, holes cut out for eyes. Designed to obscure what it needed to, namely that beard and that red tattoo over the bridge of his nose. Anders wore one much the same.

The dog whined, cocking its head, and they both went very still; Anders let the light diminish, and Hawke tossed his staff from left hand to right, the metal blade whispering quietly over the cold dungeon floor; both of them tense, alert, ready, should the door open to silverite and swords…

But instead it opened to a woman in the blue smock of a Gallows maidservant, holding a torch and the hand of a child, and Anders could tell just by laying eyes on her that there had been no betrayal on her part. “Go,” she hissed, pushing, and the child scurried in through the cell doors; nine years old, Anders estimated, female, still in her apprentice robe and soft Circle slippers. She was followed by another apprentice, male, older.

Two.

But instead of leaving, Anaya hesitated, then said, “There’s one more.”

“We weren’t notified about this,” Anders murmured. Two at once was pushing it. The templars were growing more and more vigilant. Three?

“Opportunity,” she said. “Her phylactery’s gone with the rest. She has nightmares. She’ll be getting the brand in weeks at best.”

“How old?” Hawke whispered, already moving the two young apprentices behind him.

“Sixteen,” she said. She beckoned to someone, past the doorway and out of their line of sight; a moment later a slight shadow appeared framed within the rectangle, between them and Anaya, too slight for a normal teenager. Elvhen. “Take her. Go. Maker be with you.”

“And you,” Hawke said, “Wherever you go.”

The iron door shut behind Anaya. Whoever her real name had been, whatever her story - or, more likely, whomever she had lost, Anders would never know. Bancroft had found her, and she had come through for the Underground when needed. “What’s your name?” Anders asked the girl, who was watching him with large blue eyes, fear writ plain on her face.

“Lisse,” she said.

“That’s a nice name,” Hawke said. “I’m Love. That’s Sweetheart. We didn’t think these pseudonyms through.”

“Maker’s breath,” Anders muttered. “Don’t listen to him, he thinks he’s funny.”

“I’m hilarious,” Hawke said, comfortably. “Now listen, Lisse - kids - we’re getting you out of here and somewhere safe. In order to do that, you need to stick close together. If there’s fighting, hold onto each other, and stay close, alright?”

Lisse’s eyes were like saucers. “If there’s going to be… fighting?” she asked. “Serah, will… will someone attack us?”

Hawke glanced at his dog, which cocked its head, whimpered. There was blood smeared thickly around its muzzle, black in the magelight. “Wouldn't be the first time,” he said.

* * *

“Seriously?” Isabela throws her head back, howling with laughter. “I can’t believe you took Anders on a romantic stroll of _Sundermount_!”

“He needed elfroot,” says Hawke, grinning at her easily, body sprawled loose and lazy in his chair and his arm tucked once more along the back of Anders's. “Didn’t I say it? Mother told me to do something we both enjoy, and well, where did we go six days after meeting Anders? Sundermount! Point, proved. It was very… scenic.”

“Dangerous too, I should think,” says Merrill. “Does this go back to the knives?”

“In a way,” Hawke says. “Not an innuendo-y way, Isabela, don’t think I can’t see you leering in my peripherals.”

“I’ll bet you inn-you-Anders’s-endo’d,” Isabela says, casually amiable.

“How many ales has the sot had this evening?” Aveline asks Fenris, who shrugs.

“Always room for more,” Varric opines, quill flowing. “So, Blondie… Sundermount?”

“Hawke’s choice,” Anders says shortly, taking a sip from his cup of cider.

“See any unspeakable horrors?”

“Not that evening,” Hawke says. “My mother was, to be fair, quite clear on the subject of unspeakable horrors and dates. She said: do something that makes you both happy.”

* * *

The sound was a curiously familiar one; it haunted his memories, or more accurately his nightmares. West Hill. He’d made it as far as West Hill before they caught him, and he’d bear the marks of that particular escape with him for life. 

“Hawke,” he said, calling up to his lover at the head of their convey, the three apprentices grouped up and holding hands for dear life between them, filthy feet splashing through sewer water and muck, “Dogs.”

“I know,” Hawke said shortly, his staff sending ripples through the scum every time he struck the ground with the heavy metal blade. His mabari was ranging around them, ears pinned back, forelegs curled; it moved with wariness and suspicion, a hunting hound at work. Its master, shaggy as the dog with his wolf's fur hood drawn low over his masked face, half-turned and gestured with one arm for the apprentices to keep up. “Come on!”

“We can’t outrun their bloodhounds,” Anders snapped, drawing to his side. “The Templars breed them just for this, one of us should stay back - ”

“No,” Hawke said. “We have to -”

“Love,” Anders interrupted, “I can do it. Justice and I. The hounds will come first, I can buy us some time -”

“If you stay behind to face the hounds, the templars will have you,” Hawke said. “I can’t let that happen. Come on, you lot, let’s go, the boat’s waiting for you -”

The little girl tripped; only Lisse’s grip on her shoulder saved her from going face-first into the muck. Hawke doubled back, bent slightly at the knees, gave her his hand; she ignored it, clinging to Lisse. Her eyes were enormous. Her teeth chattered.

“Their shoes weren’t exactly made for this, love,” Anders said, catching Hawke’s eye. He set his hand, very gently, on Hawke’s wrist, still outstretched. “Look, Justice and I…”

“I’m not losing either of you,” Hawke breathed. He bent down, seizing the apprentice by her shoulder, and hauled her to her feet; giving the kids a wan smile he said, “Look, there are some people chasing us, so Sweetheart and I are going to… scare them off. Go with the dog down that side passage, just there, you see it? He’ll take you to the ocean while we show the scary people what happens when they chase little mages.”

“Are you going to kill them?” Anders could see the whites all around Lisse’s eyes, but also the gleam of her teeth. Her grip on the other apprentice girl was almost white-knuckled. When Hawke nodded - once, pointedly, with a certain respect - her grip loosened, and she smiled. 

Tranquil, Anaya said, and Anders could guess why. He didn’t want to know what the oh-so-brave, fearless, _just_ defenders of the Gallows had done to a sixteen-year-old mage that had them fearing the consequences of her emotions, but the worst of it was, he probably already knew.

Behind them came the baying of the hunting hounds, and Hawke gave his wrist a quick, impulsive squeeze. Anders’s heart clenched in his chest, at the easy confidence in his posture, the way his lover swaggered over to the children, unslid the dagger from his hip and offered it, without censure, to Lisse: a weapon, and in more ways than one. A last ditch effort. A last chance. A last line of defense. They exchanged a long look, girl and man, and Anders's heart ached. She was too young for desperate choices - as if there was ever an appropriate age, as if any time was the right time to decide between _Tranquil_ or a last stand fueled by a _demon_.

“Go,” said Hawke. “Dog’ll keep you safe.”

The dogs howled, and Anders’s right-hand hamstring ached, ghostly memory of teeth and the dirt road to West Hill so rough against his cheek; he’d bled, and howled almost as loud as the dogs, fourteen and outgrowing his robes week-by-week; and the hounds had wagged their tails, blood on their jowls and happy to have done their jobs right. 

Never again, he’d sworn. And this time, he wasn’t alone.

Justice was singing in his chest, a vibration in his very bones, perfect counterpoint to the cry of the dogs; and Hawke was at his side, steadfast, loyal. A wave of strength washed through him, heating him to the tips of his ears. Nobody else in this damned city had listened but one, and he was here, and he made Anders feel half a hundred times lighter.

This wasn't love, not the way the romance novels told it, not the way he had thought it could be. Nothing about them was. Maybe it couldn't afford to be.

* * *

“To think,” Aveline says, with a laugh, “You mocked my marigolds…”

“They were mock-worthy!” Hawke protests, to be met with general amusement.

“A sandwich, though?” Varric asks, grinning. “Really, Hawke? Right after the epic declaration of love? Oh, this is too perfect!”

“He’ll be an inspiration to generations of romantic poets,” Anders adds, taking another sip of his ale, and his gaze is somewhere far away.

“I am writing this down,” Varric decides. “This is the worst romantic proposal since 'I’d drown us in blood to keep you safe’ - it’s gotta go in the book.”

“What book?” Merrill asks, leaning curiously toward him; he shifts his parchment away from her, covering up the words he’s just written.

“An outrageous pack of lies,” Fenris says, drily. Aveline offers him the ale pitcher, which he accepts with an agreeable smile, small and thin though it is. “Varric’s _questionable_ gift to Kirkwall’s literary establishment.”

“Y'know, ever since Hawke taught you to read, you’ve become a real snob, Broody,” Varric complains, but fondly.

“Steering the conversation back onto this humiliating track,” Isabela says, grinning, “I can’t believe - you gave Aveline so much stick for her admittedly hilariously awful flirting -”

“ _Thank you, Isabela_ ,” Aveline says, through gritted teeth -

“- And your idea of a date is a _picnic_ on Sundermount? Hawke! That’s so boring!”

Hawke shrugs. “It’s what Anders wanted, wasn’t it?” He’s grinning, a little sheepishly. “My mother said -"

"Ah, here we go," Isabela says, "Homespun Hawke family wisdom, you lot know the rules."

"I'm not taking a shot," Aveline says. "Not from _this_ place's whiskey."

"I would not worry, if I were you," Fenris advises. "The tavern-keep can hardly fit a _whole_ rat inside a whiskey keg, surely."

This sets them off on a tangent about Corff's rodent-to-alchohol ratio, depending on ale vs cider vs spirits; Norah and Edwina are both drafted in at various points in the debate to provide witness accounts of both the Hanged Man's storage conditions and rat problem. More drinks are ordered, as evidence, and as the tavern empties around them and the moon rises higher and higher in the sky, a patch of silver beyond the foundry smoke, they're still in good spirits.

All of them but for one, and literally at that. Anders sits at Hawke's side, silent and still, nursing the same cup of cider he had when Aveline first walked in. The dog has its head on his knee, and his fingers are at work scratching gently behind one of its ears, and his gaze is somewhere distant and far away as around him the table is alight with drink and talk.

He looks to Aveline like a doll, rather than a man. She wonders if this is how he looks whenever his demon releases him, like a puppeteer setting down the strings after a performance; she cannot picture this man ever being _happy_ , let alone smiling the way Donnic had, backed against her desk not even a half-day ago, eyes alight and only on her. 

They're seeing each other again in two days, when their shifts match up and they're both free. She looks down at the tankard in her hand, at the foam at the top, and then glances again sidelong at Anders, at the thinness of his mouth and hunching of his shoulders. Across from her Hawke is leaning toward Isabela, the two of them passing a snifter of whiskey back and forth, taking tentative sips and making loud estimates on the percentage of rat in the brew.

It takes a couple tries to clear her throat, unlock her voice. She hadn't realised she was that... well. That she had had so much. "Hawke," she says, and says it again until she has his attention, "What did she say? Your mother?"

Hawke looks momentarily caught out. "Er," he says. "Don't eat yellow snow?" He tries for a grin, teeth very white in his face - it's a liar's grin, Aveline knows him too well. She narrows her eyes and he ducks his head, sheepish, caught out. 

"I'm seeing Donnic again soon -" Isabela wolf-whistles, Aveline rolls her eyes, says, half-serious, half-not, "Shut it, you tart. I'm seeing Donnic again soon. I just wondered..."

Anders's eyes flick toward Hawke, silent, watching as Hawke's thumb traces not the nape of his neck but instead the rim of his whiskey glass - cheap, Hanged Man fare, so unlike the crystal snifters in the cabinets at his estate. Aveline has no word for the things she sees on Anders's face, there for a half-heartbeat and gone again as Hawke pushes the empty glass away, smiles, and says, "My mother said that everybody loves differently. So long as everyone's happy, there's no crime in that. And Sundermount, _Isabela_ , may be boring but it was _peaceful_. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and nothing much happened - and nothing makes Anders or I happier than a little bit of _quiet_."

* * *

The last of the hounds leapt for Hawke with a furious bark, echoing through the narrow corridors of the sewer, and Hawke hit it full-force in the chest with an undiminished stonefist. It screamed as it died, taking with it the last illusion of escaping undetected.

Anders lowered his staff, breathed in and then out. The sewer pipe was littered with bodies, killed as quickly and cleanly as the two of them could manage; the beasts were not their masters, and could not be held accountable for their decisions the way the men who managed them could be. _Should_ be. Despite that they still had value. The loss of a trained scenthound would hurt the masters, would take time to replace.

Hawke kicked the body away from them, splashing toward him through the foul-smelling run-off. They'd need to burn their clothes after this, if they made it out of this. Anders clasped Hawke's wrist, briefly, the way the Wardens had sometimes before a sojourn; brotherhood in battle, a bond he had found faintly embarrassing when he wore the Grey but now recognised instinctively.

"What now?" There was dog's blood on Hawke's face, splashed across the kaddis. He wiped it off against his shoulder, unblinking; if he had been reminded of his mabari by the bloodhounds he had pulled no punches regardless, recognising that this mattered beyond them. _We are the cause of mages_ , Anders thought, aglow with affection from his very core.

He made himself turn away from Hawke, hefting his staff. "They'll open with a blanket silence, covering as much of the area as they can," he said, reaching out to pinch a thread off Hawke's magic and weaving it with his own, attuning Hawke in to the fabric of the runes he began to draw underneath the dirty brown water to protect him from their effects. "They’ll want to clear the ground of any magic first, to get rid of things like this, but if we’re careful they won’t be able to get rid of them all.”

Lightning sparked around the edges of Hawke’s fingers. “If they’re all busy laying a silence, I might have time to get a few spells off before the first smite,” he said.

“Hit them hard,” Anders warned him. “Show no quarter. They won't show you any. They’re templars, they’ve spent their whole lives learning how to slaughter us, love.”

“I've seen what they can do," Hawke said, grim. Anders wondered if he was thinking of his sister, so long dead; of his father, hounded out of this very city, fled with nothing but his desire to have a family. Whatever the reason, his eyes glittered in Anders's magelight, for a moment as blue as the lyrium vials at Anders's belt."As long as the kids get clear.” 

Anders extinguished his light, the better to let their eyes adjust; the dark served them better than the hound-masters. He reached out on memory, his left hand groping at empty air until his little finger found cloth; Hawke made a small noise and after a moment shifted beneath his touch, slipping his fingers in between Anders's.  
Ahead of them, something clanged; metal rattled, water shivered. The tunnel ahead of them had orange at the end. Hawke squeezed his hand, and he squeezed back.

There was so much he could say, _till the day we die_ or _I’d drown us in blood to keep you safe_ to _your support has meant the world to me_ to finally, truthfully, _I love you, and I always will_ \- but Hawke already knew it all. 

He was a man who had looked at Anders’s life, the split duality of it, spirit and man and mage, and said, _I will give you all that I can_.

Maker, but Anders loved him. He turned away, and he tightened his grip on his staff with his free hand, and he thought: _come on, then_ , and waited for silverite. Something in him felt - jagged, and sharp, and dangerous, and his heart was in his throat - but Hawke had his back. 

Whatever else he had, he would always have that.

* * *

It’s several hours later when Aveline sets down her latest ale mug and says, “Your mother was wise, Hawke.”

“Sometimes,” Hawke agrees, back to toying with Anders’s hair.

“I suppose,” Aveline continues, her mouth ale-heavy, her tongue resisting, “That to a pair of… refugees,” her tactful silence making her meaning plain, “A mundane date would be exciting.”

“There’s certainly that,” Hawke says, politely dodging her mug.

Anders eyes her with disdain. “What are you implying?” he snaps.

“Nothing,” Aveline says, rolling her eyes.

“Everything,” Isabela adds, in a low voice, then laughs throatily. “Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention, lost interest a couple of ales ago. What’s happening?”

“Hawke and Anders,” Aveline says. “They spend their time together being boring and ordinary precisely because they are extra-ordinary. I understand the impulse. I… It’s familiar, that’s all.”

Anders’s mouth twists. “That’s almost _tolerant_ of you, Captain,” he says.

“You’re a sour bastard,” Aveline tells him. “But… even you deserve a moment. For Hawke's sake, if nothing else.”

“What happened to 'he’s all but cursed’?”

Aveline sighs. “Never mind,” she says. “Just… enjoy your boring dates.”

“Oh,” says Hawke, and smiles, “They’re never boring. Not to us.”

“I’m going to be sick,” Isabela says. “Mostly because of the ale, not because of you being disgusting. Ugh, I think Corff gave me the sixty-percent plus rat casket. If nothing else, he needs to add some snakes to his kegs, that would solve the rat problem."

“Mmm,” Fenris agrees, fresh-faced and sipping tentatively at his twelfth mug. "And perhaps, when the drink begins to taste more like snake than rodent, he should add dog?"

"Could call it Fereldan fancy," Hawke suggests, covering his grin with his cup. "I could bring some with us to Sundermount for our next picnic, hmm?"

Anders wrinkles his nose.

Varric bangs his mug on the table, grinning. “As fun as the idea of you horrifying Blondie with dog beer is, Hawke, it's getting late. And you're all getting rowdy."

"To rowdiness!" Isabela hoots, slamming her tankard down against the tabletop hard enough to leave a mark and slapping it with her free hand; Merrill joins in, and then Hawke, and when he is followed by a reluctant Fenris Aveline can't help but join in too. The racket continues until, with a deep sigh, Varric dips his head and gives in, drumming three quick beats against the table with his free hand.

"To Aveline," Hawke says, standing; he's swaying, but his eyes are creased at the corner with amusement. "To Aveline, and her copper marigolds."

She tips her mug toward him, staying seated. "And to you, Hawke," she says, in her Captain's voice to carry above the din. "And your quiet first dates in your otherwise not-so-quiet lifestyle.”

“With friends like you,” Hawke says, laughing, “I barely need… Cotorie, Carta, Qunari, Templars, bandits, thugs, gangsters, slavers - ”

“Giant Dalish death-spiders,” Isabela adds helpfully.

“Giant Dalish death-spiders _especially_ ,” Hawke agrees. His thumb is rubbing back and forth at the back of Anders’s neck; he's leaning toward Anders, but his eyes are bright with a drunkard's clarity. “Blood mages, more templars, the entire Chantry -”

“Tal Vashoth,” Fenris says, and when they glance at him, shrugs. “You specified _Qunari_.”

“Fine,” Isabela says, smirking. She raises a tankard; it is not hers, nor did she have it even a minute ago. Many of their group surreptitiously glance around at nearby tables for the source, to little avail. “To Hawke: my boring exciting friend. And to Aveline! Who, I’m sure, is going to have a long hard duty roster ahead of her…”

Aveline groans, and everyone laughs; and amidst the laughter Hawke leans in and kisses Anders's temple, soft and sure, and Anders lets the corner of his mouth edge up in something that almost might be a smile.

* * *

In the dark, Hawke’s breathing sounded much closer than it was. The sewer was a tightly-enclosed tunnel, stench and strangeness and the inevitable, and Anders felt wound-up, coiled tight like a spring. Templars. A whole pack. Worth it, he knew, for free mages.

“When you said you wanted to spend the evening with me,” he said, mostly to empty the silence, and the wait, “I imagine this wasn’t quite what you had in mind.”

“Oh?” Hawke’s voice floated toward him from somewhere to his left. A small soft scraping sound, water swishing; the blade of his staff. 

Anders licked his lips. He could smell lyrium, now, the templars were that close; and the hairs on his arms were standing up, gathering energy. His heart thudded in his chest. It didn't matter how many years it had been, he supposed, how much blood he had spilled, how riven his soul; some part of him would always be the boy on his first escape, three weeks on the run and hiding underneath a wagon as the templars swept, swept, swept the street - his blood on a chain around their throats, their gauntletted fingers pinching and indifferent.

"I know that this isn't..." He hesitated, fumbling for the words. _Copper marigolds_. Or, "Conventional."

Silence; then, from Hawke, "This is what I want, Anders. Not because you want it. I could be one of those kids. Bethany could have... This matters. To you, to me."

Anders wished he could see Hawke's face, or that Hawke could see his. Something like this - it was not for the darkness, the faint sussuration of templar conversation, of boots marching in sync. Every part of him felt aglow, a soft light, a warm light, starting in his chest and spreading through him town to his toes and into the shell of his ears; every part of him felt agreement. Hawke understood, and more, _cared_ , and Anders felt somehow both smaller and grander than himself simultaneously.

Before he had a chance to dwell on the feeling, the completeness, something - some _one_ rattled ahead, metallic in the darkness, and Anders’s whole body jerked - like a fisherman had hooked him right through the stomach and was yanking on the line. Something in his chest pinched; his fingers tightened, spasming around his staff; he grit his teeth and his runes began to glow, sharp on the floor, gold underneath the brown water - the silence hit him first, but by then it was already too late. 

Blue cracks, on the heel of his thumb. The world, reduced to short sharp sensations, filtered blue. Silverite! And the anger he felt, roaring up in him, raging; the Chantry was made of _men_ and so were its weapons, what right did they have to mutilate mages; three apprentices and a law fundamentally older than Anders himself  
\- woven into the very essence of his being, down down down in the core of his heart, where his soul had first split: _this injustice must be fought_.

Hawke was there. There was heat, and fire, and flesh. The anger permuted all of it, and his whole body sang; but Hawke was there, and so was his magic, at their back. As always. They could trust him. They did trust him. Distraction, he was, and had been; but here he was, aiding, assisting, answering their need. Silverite burned, and Hawke cast like the hedge mage he was, all unrefined power and huge, wild lashes of borrowed energy.

In the mortal world he was beautiful. Here, in the glow of their shared gaze, he was something else, something more, and the being that they were, the soul that had once been Anders and had once been Justice but was now something else, something that answered to a mortal's name and a spirit's purpose, loved him with all that it could.

Anders came back to himself to the smell of roasting flesh, and Hawke, smoke still curling up from closed fists. His head was spinning. “Hawke,” he said, sagging against a wall, a hand to his temple; there was an ache behind his eye, part mana exhaustion and part regular old mortal exhaustion. He could taste metal against his teeth. Fires burned throughout the tunnel, and the space felt tight, like the air was finite. Hawke touched his shoulder, and he made the walls expand.

“What, no 'love’?” Hawke quipped. He was watching Anders carefully, with concern rather than fear. “I had a half-dozen puns I was going to build up to. How do you feel?”

“Sore,” Anders admitted. He pushed himself off the wall and stepped carefully over the nearest body, torn into three pieces and the edges of its armour melting into the wound, and knelt by the fanciest corpse; the bars on its shoulders said Knight-Lieutenant. The wounds said primal mage. The sewer water soaked into the cloth of his trousers, but he hardly noticed. “The apprentices -”

“Safe,” Hawke said. “Dog returned while you were, um, how shall we say… lighting up the night.”

A weight lifted. Anders sighed, raised a hand to rub his head, and winced when it came back sticky: blood, not his own. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Hawke said, working one foot under a silverite-clad lower leg, not attached to an upper leg. “This was my idea.”

Anders frowned. “I should have - ”

“Besides,” said Hawke, leaving the leg behind. His expression was amused, soft at the edges, and when he stood up and held out a hand Anders took it mostly on reflex. His palm was warm, and strong, and Anders had not realised how much he had come to love this raw pure physicality; affection, given freely and without expectation of repayment. Aura had... Kristoff had... Karl had...

He dragged his mind back to Hawke, back to his warm eyes, and the dried blood smeared raggedly across his face. "Besides?"

“You remember what I told you my mother said, about dating? Finding something that appeals to both of you?”

“I hardly think eradicating a templar mage-hunter squadron in a sewer qualifies,” Anders said, glancing around the corpses, burned and blackened; they barely looked human any more. He hadn't done all this damage, not by himself. Nor had Justice.

Hawke shrugged. “Can’t really afford to be a snob, love,” he said, amused. He squeezed Anders’s hand, very gently. “Not often I get a chance to support you and Justice at the same time.”

Anders snorted despite himself. “Some date,” he said, letting Hawke draw him closer; letting Hawke slip a heavy arm around his shoulders, holding him close. 

They would have to move on soon, back to the estate, back to their lives - Hawke the nobleman, the hidden apostate who could not put himself at risk; Anders, the Darktown Healer - there was no telling when the Underground would be able to make another move on the Gallows. This small, feeble victory - Lisse and the two apprentices free, their pursuers gone - this would have to tide Anders over for a long time.

Hawke was solid against his side, and in that moment, however, it was hard to dwell on the oncoming storm, now with the glow of victory riding high in his chest and the casual way the edges of Hawke's eyes creased as he smiled. “Don’t worry,” he said, “I’ll think of something else to tell our friends. How do you feel about Sundermount…?”

Anders reached up and cupped Hawke’s face between his palms, and kissed him right there in the middle of the sewers. It was better than speaking.

It probably wasn’t an ideal date. But then again, when it came to fade spirits and apostates, possession and the murky grey area in-between, it was what they had. He was Justice and Justice was him, and somewhere in between them, there was Hawke. It wasn't a story for the ages; it was just a _story_ , and it was the only one Anders had. He didn't know where the road would end, couldn't flip to the end of the book and see their route laid clear; this opportunity, to be with Hawke, to love him, even if they were never quite sure, these days, who they were - it was the only one they had.

And maybe the only one that mattered, when it came down to it.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration for the Justice!Anders merger borrowed heavily from De Carabas, [here](http://carabas.tumblr.com/post/138558206852/sorting-through-my-justice-anders-merger), in particular this line about Justice in the friendmance: "When Hawke supports mage rights, supports his cause, that’s showing affection in a way that BOTH sides of Anders understand and appreciate."


End file.
